From 2008 to 2012, my country’s smart cities experienced the first wave, which can be called the concept introduction period. During this period, the construction of smart cities was driven by industry applications. Key technologies included wireless communications, optical fiber broadband, HTTP, GIS, GPS technology, etc. Information systems were mainly built in a single department, a single system, and independently, forming a large number of information islands and information sharing. Use point-to-point spontaneous sharing more often. The industrial strength is relatively single, and foreign software system integrators dominate the development of the smart city industry after introducing the concept.
From 2012 to 2015, during the pilot and exploratory period, smart cities began to embark on the path with Chinese characteristics and set off the second wave. Under the background of China’s accelerated urbanization, this stage focuses on promoting the comprehensive application of RFID, 3G/4G, cloud computing, SOA and other information technologies. System construction presents the characteristics of horizontal and vertical segmentation. Information sharing is based on a shared exchange platform, focusing on key projects or Collaborative applications are the starting point. As for the main body of promotion, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development took the lead at the central ministries and commissions level and selected 290 pilot projects across the country to extensively explore the paths and models of smart city construction. Domestic and foreign software developers, system integrators, equipment vendors, etc. actively participate in the construction of all aspects.
After 2016, the country proposed a new smart city concept, emphasizing data-driven, people-oriented, unified recruitment, and practical results. Key technologies include NB-IoT, 5G, big data, artificial intelligence, blockchain, smart city platforms and operating systems. etc., information systems are evolving towards horizontal and vertical joint large systems, and information sharing methods are changing from movement-based to function-based sharing. In terms of promotion methods, a pattern of government guidance and market leadership has gradually formed. On the government side, 25 national ministries and commissions have comprehensive coordination, and on the market side, telecom operators, software vendors, integrators, and Internet companies have gathered together in an ecosystem.
The smart city standard specification system is becoming increasingly complete
Following the promulgation of the first national smart city standard “GB/T 33356-2016 New Smart City Evaluation Indicators” in 2016, my country released five national standards for smart cities in 2017, and in 2018, up to 11 smart city standards were released, covering the top level Design, platform, technology application and data integration have become the key years for the comprehensive establishment of smart city standards and regulations system. The multi-level, all-round and intensively released standard system points out the direction for the healthy and orderly development of new smart cities, and also lays the basic conditions for the collaborative cooperation of various industrial entities. It marks the transition of smart cities from the exploratory stage to the standardized development stage, and will further bring wisdom The agglomeration of urban industrial ecology.
Intelligent infrastructure helps improve urban carrying capacity
Various types of urban infrastructure are gradually realizing large-scale intelligent upgrades based on mobile Internet of Things and other technologies, which will greatly increase the city’s carrying capacity. Currently, applications such as smart meter reading, smart parking, and smart manhole covers based on NB-IoT are emerging in endlessly. The smart infrastructure that will have the greatest impact on the future is undoubtedly the multi-functional smart poles and intelligent upgrades of road facilities.
With the rapid growth of the construction demand for city-level sensing infrastructure, the need for coordinated deployment of sensing facilities has become increasingly urgent. Multifunctional smart poles integrate wireless communication, information interaction, smart lighting, video surveillance, traffic management, environmental monitoring, emergency help and other functions. Integrated into one, it may become an integrated carrier for new sensing facilities, gradually being fully installed, deployed in an overall manner, and co-constructed and shared. In 2018, Shenzhen issued the “Shenzhen Multifunctional Pole Intelligent System Technology and Engineering Construction Specifications” to carry out the construction of multifunctional smart poles, and the installation was fully rolled out across the city.
Autonomous driving technology has driven the intelligent upgrading of urban road facilities, and many cities have taken the lead in deploying test site facilities. For example, Beijing is building the country’s first driverless pilot road in Yizhuang, transforming signals, signs, markings, etc. to facilitate the identification of autonomous vehicles; Shanghai expanded the driverless open road from 5.6 kilometers to 12 kilometers in 2018, and is actively conducting research and development. The country’s first new road sign marking system; Wuhan deployed the first 260 sets of smart traffic signs based on NB-IoT, laying the foundation for road facilities for driverless driving.
The widespread application of artificial intelligence technology will greatly improve the level of urban governance services
Artificial intelligence technology has greatly improved the level of intelligence in public services and social governance, and will completely change the problems of poor citizen satisfaction and low sense of gain in traditional smart cities. Comrade Xi Jinping recently emphasized the need to strengthen the integration of artificial intelligence and social governance, promote the construction of smart cities, and use artificial intelligence to improve public services and social governance. In recent years, artificial intelligence technology has been applied in many fields such as smart city public security, health care, transportation and travel, and has achieved remarkable results. For example, the Beijing Public Security System uses artificial intelligence technology to efficiently process massive cases and police information data. It can use the machine brain to process 12,000 letters per hour, retrieve keyword-matching results in 0.3 seconds, and can create a set of reports for every 10,000 reports. With 8 million clues, the accuracy of predicting police situations is as high as 92%.
Classification has become the basic guide for the construction of new smart cities
Different regions, different levels, and different types of cities have different development orientations and focuses. Different cities’ economic and social, geographical locations, natural environments, and industrial basic conditions are also different. Therefore, there are large differences in the level of smart city construction and development goals. There is no A single unified solution for all cities. It is necessary to comprehensively consider the urban development positioning, economic and social development level, population size, and location characteristics, adapt to local conditions, find the correct positioning, and find targeted development paths for various cities. Generally speaking, very large cities should be supported to benchmark against international advanced levels and build world-class smart city clusters; provincial cities should play a radiating and leading role to form regional economic and social activity centers; prefecture-level and county-level cities should focus on urban and rural coordination, Narrow the digital divide and promote balanced development; promote the characteristic and differentiated development of new cities, new districts, and small towns.
Among all types of smart cities, new cities and new districts will become the first highlights to explore innovation in the next stage. New cities and new districts are new carriers of new urbanization and experimental fields for the development of smart cities. The construction of digital twin cities in new cities and new districts using urban information models as key technologies may become the next trend. Digital twin city is a city information model (CIM) based on data-driven, software-defined, platform support, virtual and real interaction, which enables the digital city and the real city to be planned and constructed simultaneously, realizing the digitization of the entire process and all elements, and achieving the real-time state of the city ization and visualization, and urban management decision-making and service collaboration and intelligence. Xiongan New Area and Beijing Sub-center have widely used CIM technology to build digital twin cities.
Internet companies have become new promoters of new smart city construction
In addition to traditional smart city practitioners such as equipment vendors and integrators, Internet companies have become new entrants to the market, using artificial intelligence or Internet portals as the starting point to seize new smart cities, and quickly seize market share with their advantages in technology, users, platforms, and innovation capabilities. , enriching the new smart city industrial ecosystem. For example, Alibaba proposed City Brain in Hangzhou in 2016, and launched City Brain 1.0 and 2.0 versions respectively in 2017 and 2018, and proposed to fully open the AI capabilities of the City Brain platform to provide computing power and data in eight major fields, including urban transportation and medical care. Algorithms, management models, etc., bringing together upstream and downstream practitioners in an attempt to build a smart city super ecosystem centered on Alibaba. In 2017, Tencent jointly invested with China Telecom, China Mobile, and China Unicom to establish Digital Guangdong Network Construction Co., Ltd. to provide full-process technical support for Guangdong’s digital government reform. In 2018, it launched the Guangdong Provincial Affairs App, using WeChat as the entrance to integrate Guangdong Province’s public services, forming Super App in smart city field.
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